I think people who post every detail of their lives on Facebook, along with every photo they've ever taken, are annoying as hell. Especially those of the "OMG I was sooooooo drunk!" variety. But the media pretends that girls are the only ones doing it!! THAT is what infuriates me! Boys can post all the drunken pics they want and they fly under the radar. But there's nation-wide panic at the thought of girls doing it.

This article on the Facebook group is just mirroring a "report" a few weeks ago from foxnews.com about the same Facebook group. The only reason the "investigation" was conducted was that nothing gets page views like drunken college girls proudly displaying their lack of inhibition.

It's stupid, but it gets plenty of people (e.g. old men) clicking.

It's irritainment. Best ignored, served lukewarm.

I think the drinking and the sexism reinforce each other in negative ways. First of all, the increased publicity of it all draws in those guys who want to take advantage of drunk girls. So before it was a problem, but it is like we are making it easier and easier for those guys to find women to take advantage of. Secondly, the whole party culture reinforces the notion to guys that you should get women drunk to have sex with them. As a young guy, I can tell you that the message I get from society, and from women specifically in a college environment, is that if you provide the beer then we can party (and hook-up). I find this weird enough by itself, but its pretty easy to see how this kind of message translates for many men as: get women drunk so you can take advantage of them.

I understand why you don't want to shame women for behaviour that men can engage in. But whether or not that is fair, this kind of culture probably encourages sexist attitudes among men. I'm not saying we should blame women for the culture, but the culture is definitely making things worse.

CNN is on in the student center here, and the headline on the story is "Drunk and Not Ashamed"--unlike Samhita, the CNN journo doesn't even discuss binge drinking. The entire story is about these women's evidently horrifying lack of shame. Honestly, watching the segment leaves the impression that there would be no problem if a Facebook poster would just feel bad about posting drunk photos. Nobody cares that women are drinking so much that they pass out in their own puke. The problem is that they're honest about it. The horror!

And what's up with the OMGGIRLZGONEWILD angle? I know we've all seen drunk boy pics on Facebook. Or is shame just a female virtue?

Excuse me, mpowell? Did you really just say that? Women are not responsible for the drinking culture and there are plenty of women out there who would laugh in your face if you suggested that getting them drunk would get you laid (Hi! I'm one of them!)

You say you don't want to shame women, but you are. And you read a feminist blog, so you must know that what you're saying is ridiculous.

Our culture of course encourages sexist attitudes among men. But you seem to think that makes it ok. (Hint: It doesn't).

Sorry mpowell, but your post is basically a rehash of the old "Don't get drunk or men might rape you" mantra. Drinking culture doesn't promote sexism. Expecting women to be responsible for men's bad behavior promotes sexism.

Soisastomabel, I don't think mpowell is blaming women. He is just stating what he has observed in a college party setting. In saying something like "Excuse mpowell? Did you really just say that?" it is you who are shaming him in a confrontational way.

aside from the whole "shaming of women who party like normal college kids" issue, which is of course beyond ridiculous, i never understood why everyone (read: old people) are flipping out over social networking sites.

facebook is even better than myspace with regard to privacy customization, so it's really astoundingly easy to set up a profile, post all the drunk pictures of yourself that your little heart desires and set the privacy to where only people you know can see them, not random searchers (like employers). really, it's like, a few clicks, problem solved.

I think that this is all part of the distraction machine-- OMG, Lindsey Lohan and Paris Hilton, OMG, they're leading our girls into sin, OMG pay attention to how skinny Nicole Richie, Britney is fat! OMG, pay attention pay attention pay attention to "Girls Gone Wild"--and ignore the rise in birth-control pills on college campuses and women's health centers for the poor, ignore the cuts in domestic spending for school lunch programs and domestic violence shelters--ignore corporate welfare and begrudge young women/girls sex education classes and begrudge them medicaid to pay for the delivery/pre-natal care of children conceived as a result of abstinence only programs...because after all, its all Lindsey Lohan, Britney Spears, and Paris Hilton's FAULT.

Distract distract distract...unless you go trolling for these pictures on Facebook, they aren't going to force themselves on your virgin eyes. Men and women/ boys and girls can be self-absorbed and insist on recording every minute of their social lives on social networking sites--but the media pays attention to the chicks because that's where the shock is and that's where the narrative of "Young Women Today" (read while shaking your head) is directing us.

Soisaystomabel,

I do read feminist blogs, so I'm familiar with responses like yours, which I feel are kind of knee-jerk. First of all, I'm well aware that there are plenty of women out there who have the attitude you say about getting them drunk. I'm just saying that's not the prevailing message men get. Say you are in college and you are looking for sexual entertainment with a willing partner. I don't think this is a sexist desire. But the message you get from ads, from media and from many women is that alcohol is pretty much integral to that. And for men without much discernment or a high level of concern for the feminist agenda to begin with, that translates into: get them drunk to take advantage of them. So I think if you start with a low level of disrespect for women, combine that with a culture where you have to get wasted to have fun, that tends to substantially increase the level of disrespect among men as well as facilitating the behaviour of those who were extremely disrespectful to begin with.

Now the way our society addresses behaviours that we don't like is very unfortunate. Instead of trying to shame men, we only shame women. Shaming people for undesirable behaviors isn't strictly the worst thing ever- it encourages the attitude that its okay occasionally, but is not a 'mature' thing to do. But shaming women for getting drunk at the same time as promoting a drunken party culture is unlikely to reduce the amount of drinking while increasing the amount of blame directed at women for it- that only makes the sexism worse. But that is different than observing: "hey, this drunken partying thing hightens the level of sexism among men", which is what I was arguing.

Maybe there are no good ways of discouraging the excessive drinking. But the fact that the method CNN uses does more harm than good, doesn't mean we can't discourage excessive drinking without shaming women being a part of it.

Does anyone else find it a little creepy that employers are looking on these sites? I mean, that's like my potential employee checking out my match.com dating profile (not that I have one, but still). While I agree that people should have a little tact and intelligence when posting things, in the end, I have to admit it seems like other people should mind their own business.

SuzyQ- Sorry, I disagree. He is excusing sexism with his comments. It's ok to shame someone for being ignorant, not okay to shame them for not having shame.

Does anyone else find it a little creepy that employers are looking on these sites? I mean, that's like my potential employee checking out my match.com dating profile (not that I have one, but still). While I agree that people should have a little tact and intelligence when posting things, in the end, I have to admit it seems like other people should mind their own business.

This reminds me of the two students who just got in trouble for posting pictures of themselves in their Halloween costumes as victims of the Tech shooting. (http://abcnews.go.com/WN/story?id=3976074&page=1)

I think this is a different example than drunken photos, but we do need to take some responsibility for what we put on public forums if it's tasteless (like the Tech costumes)/racist/sexist/homophobic/etc.

I don't agree that CNN is shaming young women (with no mention of photos of drunken men) but...Samhita said it well: "We as a society should think more about how young people are treated and feel in this day and age and why their idea of fun is tragically self destructive behavior."

Nightingale: I think so too. I took my entire profile down last week on Facebook, firstly because I've been out of college for a few years now, so it seems unnecessary anymore, but also, because I'm in the job market AND because my partner found out that corporate marketers and advertisers troll the site to collect demographic information for ads.
Last time I was job searching, two of the employers I interviewed with "friended" me on Facebook after the interview, which made me uncomfortable because I certainly wasn't friends with these people, and I didn't necessarily want them to know my sexual orientation, religion, political leanings, etc.
Deleting it seemed like the best solutiom.

One of the issues with binge drinking isn't making a fool of yourself - it's about safety. I heard a campus presentation on this topic where the speaker said that 44% of males play drinking games (that often lead to high risk drinking) to sexually manipulate females.

One of the issues with binge drinking isn't making a fool of yourself - it's about safety. I heard a campus presentation on this topic where the speaker said that 44% of males play drinking games (that often lead to high risk drinking) to sexually manipulate females.

One of the issues with binge drinking isn't making a fool of yourself - it's about safety. I heard a campus presentation on this topic where the speaker said that 44% of males play drinking games (that often lead to high risk drinking) to sexually manipulate females.

hmmm..
I agree that women shouldn't be shamed for the things men do freely... in terms of just fun pictures of you and your friends being drunk and silly, i mean tons of people (men, women, etc.) do that. If it's ok for men it should be okay for women. But I honestly think at some point it crosses the line... there's a difference between good old fashioned drinkin' fun... and being passed out in a puddle of your own vomit. I'm sorry... whether you're a man or woman or what, the latter is disgusting. I don't care who you are, I think it's gross to see those pictures. I don't want to see pictures of anyone peeing on the ground (which i've seen) or vomiting, and so on. I have pictures of myself and my friends drinking and dancing and making stupid faces but never of that other stuff. Not because I think i should be ladylike but because i think its disgusting for anyone to do.

And honestly...for those of us worried that employers are looking at our profiles... JUST PUT IT ON PRIVATE! That's what I did... I mean, I know its not some foolproof method...but its better than nothing. I have it set so that only my friends can see my pictures...why do I want random strangers looking at my profile in the first place?

Soisaystomabel: I am not sure if you saw my last post before you posted, but I have a question for you: If there is some aspect of a culture that could be a part of a non-sexist culture, but tends to increase sexism where it exists, is it excusing sexism to point this out? I think this is where we are at today. There are things, like a heavy emphasis on drinking, that I could imagine in a non-sexist culture. But it is my opinion that as boys grow up aspects of the drinking culture tend to encourage sexism among them.

When I look at the concerns of feminism today with respect to sexism around the issues we are talking about here, I wonder how much progress will really be possible as long as the aesthetics of college life remain as they are.

It is indeed always wise to make these things private. But the point is, why are people out searching for drunken photos in the first place? I cannot recall ever going to Facebook to look up anyone other than my friends, and certainly not with the goal of seeing drunken photographs and videos of strange girls. To me, the bigger problem is that girls are getting attention for these sorts of things, and it isn't always negative, either.

I understand your argument, mpowell, and it is the kind of reasoning that guided my actions in those circumstances when I was young and foolish. I still think though, that if there's an issue with one group of people exploiting, coercing, or bullying another the focus should be on changing the behavior of the perpetrators, not blaming the victims for being... well, stupid.

Men can be as stupid as they like and there are few consequences. If a man gets attacked while drunk he's still less likely to get blamed for it than a woman in similar circumstances. When we look at the odds of both events though, we see that a drunk woman is far more likely to be victimized than a drunk man. And that's not a problem with the woman. It just isn't. As helpful as it might be to give women a heads up about protecting themselves, nothing will change until we focus the floodlights on the perpetrators instead.

MPowell, just out of curiousity, what are your thoughts on so-called lipstick feminism?

sgzax - I certainly agree that we should not be blaming women for getting drunk. I just think we shouldn't be so worried about shaming women that we can't ask, "what can we do to discourage young people from binge drinking or glorifying binge drinking?"

Haven't read all of the replies, but I wanted to say snappy mackerel, you hit what I was going to say perfectly. The CNN attitude seems to imply that the problem is posting pictures of being too drunk, not the act of being too drunk.

I hate the whole "it's the perception of the problem that's the problem" argument.

I don't mean to gloss over the gender issues with this, and I appreciate the way Samhita discussed it, including the part about sexual violence. I wanted to expand that not only does it stem from men not being taught not to rape women when they are not sober, but also, men are taught that being drunk themselves can be an excuse for acting in a way that would be reprehensible if they were sober. Not the case. People who rape and hit when they are drunk are rapists and abusers. It's not the alcohol.

I was an RA for 3 years as an undergraduate and I taught a couple first-year sociology courses in grad school, and I have to say I noticed among college students, there was the old "boys will be boys" attitude regarding how male binge drinking was addressed, but female binge drinking was framed as victimization.
I think it has a lot to do with perceived agency. Women need to be protected from men AND themselves, while men are just BORN independent.

Although I agree that the only reason this story was posted was due to the gender of the participants, I also think that many employers hold any part of a potential employee's personal life that may be viewed as objectionable against them.

In my sector of the economy, there are far more qualified applicants than positions, and if these pictures (as you described them) were of men, and freely available online, a lot of employers would decline to hire. I think this would really apply for people who are in fields that involve being a public representative of the employer in any way (i.e. salesperson, lawyer).

I'm not trying to say that women wouldn't suffer from this more (b/c of societal inequities), but I don't think it would be entirely ignored for men either.

Wouldn't the best solution be to simultaneously criticize the networks for airing this kind of material solely for its salacious content, and educate young people about both binge drinking and the importance of privacy?

the same "adults -- teachers, counselors, parents" that are so worried about these photos probably go home and whack off to Girls Gone Wild videos. then they're plenty thankful for drunk college girls.

ProFeministMale: So I think what you mean by lipstick feminism is self-described feminists who still like to exhibit a lot of femininity? If that's not the case, just let me know!

I guess my attitude there is not so much different from say, Amanda Marcotte's attitude. Personally, I put quite a bit of effort into my appearance, so I don't feel that guilty about saying I appreciate women who also put in some effort to look attractive. At the same time, I recognize that its unfair for society to expect women to do more than men and I hate the fact that there are all those tv shows with the overweight guy and the really hot woman... But its pretty hard to disentangle the social from the personal. For some, wanting to be sexy is not really an expression of feminist attitudes, for others it is. And even for the latter, it can still be the case that you're setting back the 'movement' with your behavior. I'm not too inclined to hold it against anyone personally.

At the same time, I don't hold it personally against anyone who likes to get drunk. Which would I say is more of a problem? Well, the expectation of women to be beautiful seems like a more direct expression of sexism to me. And the drinking culture is a more indirect path to sexism. On the other hand, looking good is more important to me than getting drunk so I find it harder to sympathize with people who just like to go get wasted all the time.

Samhita says:

Guys in college get wasted as a ritual, they don't have to hide it from future employers, in fact they are practicing to drink with future co-workers.

I think this is worth examining. My thought is that in this age of Facebook, Myspace relentless self-documentation, men are going to suffer the consequences of posting their bad behavior online. I have heard of men (grad school age)who had potential employers show their pictures to them and say "Goodbye!".

what are people's thought on this?

Samhita says:

Guys in college get wasted as a ritual, they don't have to hide it from future employers, in fact they are practicing to drink with future co-workers.

I think this is worth examining. My thought is that in this age of Facebook, Myspace relentless self-documentation, men are going to suffer the consequences of posting their bad behavior online. I have heard of men (grad school age)who had potential employers up hold the persons facebook pictures to their faces and say "Goodbye!".

what are people's thought on this?

tc195 - i can believe that statistic, but speaking as a girl who's played her fair share of drinking games, it's not like we DON'T KNOW what the object usually is--to get everyone wasted as quickly as possible. like, no one plays beer pong or presidents and assholes or whatever thinking it's going to be a sip-fest. generally speaking, i only played those kinds of games when there was someone playing that i was at least a little bit interested in making out with.

i think that regardless of whether tons of guys THINK that they're manipulate girls by playing drinking games, the percentage of college-aged or older women who play a drinking game and are actually somehow exploited is overstated.

Oh Christ. This is this year's "rainbow parties" and jelly-bracelets-as-code-for-sexual-activities arbitrary pearl-clutching headline. Moral panic, anyone?

bezerkeley: In theory, I understand why an employer might want to check a potential hiree's information online. In theory.
In practice, when an employer searches for personal information, they can apply any prejudices they hold on the interviewee as an excuse to not give them the job (sexual orientation, religion, political leanings, etc).
For example, when you Google my first and last name, there is an article from my university's newspaper from 5 or 6 years ago about Take Back the Night in which I was interviewed. I am listed as "Firstname Lastname, sexual assault survivor" and I talk briefly (vaguely) about my situation and about female empowerment.
What if an employer sees that and decides for whatever reason not to hire me? (out of ignorance, sexist beliefs, fear of feminism, etc). I'm not ashamed at all to have it posted and I don't ever want it taken down, but that has crossed my mind.

Samhita, in my experience, you are mistaken in saying that men don't have to worry about employment consequences to this sort of thing. I volunteered extensively in my university's Office of Career Services, and everyone who worked in that office talked extensively about how difficult it was to get students to realize that posting these pictures and suchlike had real-world consequences; at no point was there any gender distinction made, and easily half the examples given were of male students. CNN may be sensationalizing the issue in a sexist way, but the actual issue is gender-blind, in my opinion. Employers do not think well of anybody who has the bad judgment to post these photos of themselves.

Does anyone else find it a little creepy that employers are looking on these sites? I mean, that's like my potential employee checking out my match.com dating profile (not that I have one, but still).

I disagree. Dating sites use screen names for a reason. The internet is public; if you post something in a public place, it's disingenuous to disapprove of people looking at it. I friendslock my LJ so that it's not available to my employers or students; I use a screen-name here for the same reason. It seems incredibly naive of students to think that employers won't google them or run their names through facebook. That's public information and easily obtainable.

first of all, a report on the news certainly does not constitute a "nationwide panic." Second, just the fact that this particular report focused on the behavior of women, does not make the observations any less justified. Also, the fact that most college-aged men act like asses for 80% of their waking lives is not justification for women to act just as foolish. The problem is a society that teaches it's young people that moderation and self control are traits which are unimportant and can easily be discarded. For both men and women. Whether or not they are documenting themselves on facebook.

Sexual assault is a very real thing, it's never going to go away, and to say that women shouldn't have to be concerned about it when they drink is foolish. It's true that they shouldn't, rape is a horribly evil and heinous thing to do another human being, but it doesn't mean it isn't going to happen. That's like saying that car accidents are bad so we shouldn't have to wear seat belts.

Personally, I don't know why people get that wasted. Maybe its because I have better things to do.

But I will agree, applying shame to women and not men is extremely sexist. From my experience, if you are a guy and get wasted and do stupid shit, its hilarious. If you're a woman and you get wasted and do stupid shit, it's irresponsible. Where's the logic in that?

That's like saying that car accidents are bad so we shouldn't have to wear seat belts.

No, it's not. Because people do not deliberately, by and large, crash their cars into other people. Men deliberately rape women. What Samhita and other feminists have been saying for years is that these messages should be directed at men: "Raping women is vile," "Be careful when you binge drink; drinking lowers your inhibitions and your sensitivity to what's going on around you and you could end up raping a woman."

"What Samhita and other feminists have been saying for years is that these messages should be directed at men: "Raping women is vile," "Be careful when you binge drink; drinking lowers your inhibitions and your sensitivity to what's going on around you and you could end up raping a woman.""

amen to that.